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Koehnen Report
- June 6, 2003 A faulty antenna cable was reported 18 months ago at the Spring Green Tower but Has NOT Been Fixed Yet! |
CIC Mission: "Saving Lives" or "Spending Money"?
by Mark Culverhouse - December 20, 2004
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Koehnen Report
- June 6, 2003 A faulty antenna cable was reported 18 months ago at the Spring Green Tower but Has NOT Been Fixed Yet! |
In 2003 Sauk County contracted Leonard J. Koehnen, PE Consulting Engineer, to review and recommend upgrades to the Sauk County wireless network. On June 6, 2003, the engineering report was completed. This is known as the Koehnen Report. The Koehen Report is of interest because it is the last engineering report obtained by the county for its wireless network. The current CIC project to replace the existing network does not conform to the Koehnen Report, yet no other engineering report exists to validate the design of the new replacement network costing over $6,000,000.
Even though the report did not recommend replacing the existing network, the Koehnen Report did recommend addressing specific maintenance and safety issues. It appears that the Sauk County emergency administrator has failed to act on these recommendations. As a result the effectiveness of the emergency communications system may have been compromised. The same person, Tim Stieve, is advocating the total replacement of the existing Spring Green tower while failing to act on recommended maintenance that could alleviate the problem being used as the reason for the tower being replaced. In addition to Spring Green tower maintenance issues, there also is the case of the communication tower in Sauk City that collapsed earlier this year. The Koehnen Report specifically recommended erecting safety markers to prevent vehicles from driving over the guy wires and causing the tower to collapse. Apparently, the wires were not subsequently marked and a tractor broke the guy wire causing the tower to collapse in 2004.
Todd Miller, former President of the Village of Spring Green, wrote a letter to Tim Stieve recently. In the letter Miller stated, "I am also concerned that the lack of maintenance noted in the engineering report was not addressed. Were the guy wires at Sauk City ever properly marked? Was it marked before it fell? Is the tower north of Spring Green adequately maintained? What happens to the radio signals when and if that tower is adequately maintained?"
Tim Stieve replied, "We were only tenants on the Sauk City tower, we did not own the tower nor the land on which it was located. We (Phil & Myself) were assigned the towers when Phil was hired in May of 2003, since then we have been properly maintaining all tower sites. Specific to Spring Green all equipment is properly functioning, the only limiting factor from a coverage point is the physical location of the tower. We have nothing to do with Cellular phone coverage, other than our new towers are engineered to handle co-location of such services."
The facts do not seem to support Tim Stieve's assurances. Below is the evidence that the Spring Green tower is not being properly maintained. Mr. Stieve has evaded answering the question about whether he informed the owner of the Sauk City tower of the dangerous situation identified by the engineer in the Koehnen Report.
In the Executive Summary of the Koehnen Report a specific comment is made on the level of recent maintenance of the Sauk County wireless network. His conclusion is that the maintenance of the county emergency communications facilities have seen better days. Despite this warning in the Executive Summary, the individual recommendations remain uncorrected to this day. This may indicate a lack of supervision over Tim Stieve's duties.
Below is a picture from the Koehnen Report in the existing Spring Green tower facilities. On the right is a recent photo taken in December 2004. The first photo on the left is of a kink in the antenna cable at the Spring Green tower. The Koehnen Report recommended that this be corrected. An antenna cable is a critical component to a wireless system. A loss of signal can drastically reduce a system's performance. The recent photo shows that the county has ignored the advice of the Koehnen Report and has not fixed the kinked cable. Is this cable the emergency fire paging antenna? Is a new tower being built in Spring Green instead of fixing a known problem with the existing tower?
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| Koehnen Report - June 6, 2003 | December 2004 |
The picture below is a blowup of the recent photo. It appears that the kink has worsened in the 18 months since the Koehnen Report was published. The kinking is very severe. A significant amount of the signal is probably being lost because of this uncorrected defect. Emergency paging may have been affected for several years and continues to degrade.
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| Dec 2004 - Kinking has worsened |
Below is the recommendation in the Koehnen Report to fix the antenna grounding. This appears not to have been done. Improper grounding can compromise signal strength.
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| Koehnen Report - June 6, 2003 | December 2004 |
The Koehnen Report made the recommendation to improve the messy installation and use of "tape" to fix problems. The recent photo demonstrates that nothing has been done concerning this problem at the Spring Green tower.
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| Koehnen Report - June 6, 2003 | December 2004 |
The Koehnen Report also documents the "soccer ball sized mouse nest" in a cabinet containing radio equipment inside the small building next to the antenna. Although, the interior was not inspected, we can only hope that more maintenance has been performed inside the building than outside.
The Koehnen Report on the existing Sauk City tower recommended that the guy wires be marked to prevent the tower from being brought down. Apparently Tim Stieve did not inform the owner of the tower to correct the violations. In 2004 the tower was brought down by a tractor driving by the guy wire.
Below is a copy of links to the Koehnen Report files in PDF Format. For best results, right-click, Save As to save the file on your machine before opening it.
